


Fall Back

by halotolerant



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Episode Related, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-23
Updated: 2012-01-23
Packaged: 2017-10-29 23:56:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/325519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halotolerant/pseuds/halotolerant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'Running – he’s been here before, John has been here before, running, refusing to believe what must be true'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fall Back

It takes hours to reach him.

It takes seconds to reach him.

Running – he’s been here before, John has been here before, running, refusing to believe what must be true – running, because if you’re fast enough you can cheat death itself, if you only want it hard enough, wish it hard enough.

The relatives he’d seen, as a doctor, he’d watched it too often, people screaming, hugging dead bodies, breathing soggy-fast and praying and refusing to believe it, pitting their will-power against reality with all the force they had, hand-slaps against solid stone, until they cringed and faded and turn inwards, scratching the wounds into themselves for not being stronger. For not wanting it enough, because if only, if only...

It takes seconds to reach him, there’s barely forty foot of ground.

It takes hours to reach him, because he can’t be there, and even as John’s moving, shoes pressing down into the soft earth, into _graves_ , John’s strangling his own hope, trying to pre-empt the disappointment, the embarrassment when he collars this man and he is not... Because he can’t be...

The air smells fresh - pine and yew and cut grass and leaf mould. It is cold. It is not a dream.

It takes hours to reach him, because it has to be a dream, and soon John’s limbs will slow, fighting, drowning in treacle, and the glimpse will be a phantom and he’ll wake, shivering and useless and more alone than he ever knew he was, before.

It takes seconds to reach him, because this is real, and there’s so little ground between them and John _knew_ , as soon as he turned round – hadn’t meant to turn, had no reason, hadn’t heard anything, just did, because why not? Because why anything, anymore? – as soon as John saw him he knew that this was real, this was really happening.

As soon as John saw him, he knew he was deluding himself. But he moved anyway, didn’t seem to have a choice, his feet pressed down and pushed him forward and it hasn’t taken long, to make these strides, to run, to bring himself here, scars breaking, bursting pain, threatening to throw him to his knees and beat him down into nothingness.

It takes hours to reach him, because it looks so much like him, even the coat. The coat is what must be doing it, creating the illusion, because no matter what John wants to believe, no matter what he sees, this can’t be true.

It takes seconds, John can’t think, can’t shake all the thoughts clear into separate feelings or even any kind of pattern, can’t hear anything but the pounding of his own blood, can’t see anything but what he thinks he sees, which cannot be what is there.

Cannot be who is there.

If John really believed this was happening, he would be angry, because if...

The thoughts won’t form. Refuse to. It’s impossible. Every sleepless night thinking ‘if’ never changed that yet.

He doesn’t seem to be feeling anything. The terrible surge of possibility is counter-weighted with the dread of what will follow. What must follow.

You can’t get what you need by running fast enough to earn it, and one lesson ought to have been enough.

His heart is beating faster, his skin is shimmering with heat, with a rising glow, exercise and something else, something terrible and wonderful and so alien, now, so forgotten, this hope.

It takes hours to reach him, getting closer, cataloguing each detail, blinking, looking over and over, a million scans from eye to nose to mouth and back again, waiting for the answer to change, waiting for the fall, the loss, the final realisation that must come, that must prove John wrong.

It takes seconds, to see, to know.

He knew all along, he knew, he always knew – from this moment, he’ll always half believe this.

And all the time reaching him, he hasn’t thought, hasn’t been able to begin to think, what happens on arrival, so he just keeps moving, closer and closer still.

“John,” Sherlock says, softly.

It takes so long, from one heartbeat to the next, one indrawn breath pushing against the one that follows, John’s cheek pressed against the stupid coat, his hands grabbing something somewhere so tightly that they ache, feeling warmth through all the layers of fabric, the first warmth in three months, slamming into bone, improbable but not impossible.

He isn’t expecting it, but after a while he feels Sherlock’s arms rising in return, going round him, holding.

This is their reunion. It takes seconds.

It takes hours.

 

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Fall Back (podfic)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/341395) by [Eccentric_Hat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eccentric_Hat/pseuds/Eccentric_Hat)




End file.
